Contemporary Group news items
Current Exhibition: 'From The Earth Wealth' Tarpey Leics. July to August (http://tarpey2011.blogspot.com/)
Recent:
'Beyond The Horizon' @ Embrace Arts Leicester, May to JulyArt On Armitage April (www.artonarmitage.com)
Upcoming:
Through A Glass Lightly' GoCart Gallery Visby, Sweden, August to September
Sense Of Place East Midlands RPS Contemporary Group, Harrington Mill Studios September
www.harringtonmillstudios.co.uk
More details Here
CONTEMPORARY-NORTHWEST
The Contemporary Group in the North West of England
Our first meeting of 2011 was held as usual at Days Inn, at Charnock Richard services on the M6, on 17 January. We were happy to welcome a new member, from Kendal. He had come to look at us earlier in 2010, and seems to have liked what he saw. A member of the RPS, but not previously a member of the Contemporary Group, he has now joined both Contemporary-North-West and the Contemporary Group itself. So we begin the new year on a favourable note.
Our meeting was largely devoted to a consideration of landscape photography, particularly the work of Fay Godwin, which is currently on exhibition at the National Media Museum in Bradford. Keith Launchberry led a discussion on approaches to landscape. He discerned three types: documentary; romantic; and sentimental. Each is subtly different, but equally valid. The approach is determined by the key objective in the mind of the photographer, his or her identification of the essential element of the desired image. In Keith’s view, this objective has to be consciously defined as the photographer’s prior intention if the resulting image is to work, and it is likely to differ from photographer to photographer confronted with any given scene - which is why no two photographs of a single subject will be the same, The actual means of achieving the desired effect are secondary, and without the primary identification are of little consequence. Fay Godwin’s approach was documentary, emphasising space and light. We looked at work by John Davies, whose approach is comparable. Ansel Adams was discussed as an example of a romantic photographer, and Paul Caponigro as a sentimental one. The discussion was lively and far-ranging, and hopefully useful.
Since our last meeting, in November, we had experimented with circulating images via email, with a view to sharing assessments and critiques. Many images had been circulated but most of us felt the experiment had been only partly successful. This was because attachments only adhere to the original email, and not to a reply to it; so the images had become detached from the comments on them, making subsequent discussions difficult to follow. We decided to look again at setting up a Flickr group site, where photographs and comments could be kept together in a single stream. Two of us were charged with looking into this, and will report back at the next meeting.
And to the next meeting, we agreed to bring two prints of an interior: any interior, so long as it is not the photographer’s own domestic one. The images may, but need not, include people, and may be made by artificial or by available light, or a mixture of the two, and the prints may be of any size. The point is to see how approaches to broadly the same subject differ from person to person, and to tempt us to step aside from our usual work, which for most of us is mainly made out of doors, into something new. Not everybody was entirely happy with this, and some of us may decide not to take part in the photography, though it is hoped they will in the discussion of the results.
Our next meeting will be on Monday, 14 March 2011, at Days Inn, as usual. Details from Ian Maxwell: mail@ihmaxwell.com, or 01524 770278
Contemporary-NorthWest meeting report
Our meeting held on 22 March 2010 saw our best attendance so far, despite the absence of some of our regular members. A few - as yet - non-members of the CG were trying us out. And an ARPS who was thinking of applying for his Fellowship in Contemporary Photography was looking for advice on the suitability of his submission for that category.
The meeting began by looking at this. The photographs – all 35mm slides of steam locomotives in action - were uniformly beautiful, but the feeling was they failed to illustrate a previsualised concept. In Contemporary Photography, the photographer’s conception, as embodied in a submitted Statement, is paramount. In this case his Statement was more a general musing on railways than a concept. The photographs, moreover, excellent as they were, amounted more to a collection of individual images than a themed body of work. Although our guest was disappointed with our reaction, the process of viewing and discussing the photographs was helpful in identifying the sometimes elusive essence of Contemporary photography.
Mike Jackson next gave us a rundown on Flickr, and we talked further about the possibility of setting up a Contemporary-NorthWest site. There are three types of group site. A public site is open to all: all may access it and all may post to it. A public (private) site may be accessed by all, but only group members may post. A private site can be viewed only by group members, and only group members may post. The general view of the meeting was that a public (private) site would be most appropriate for us. But would sufficient people use the site to make it worth having? We agreed to talk further about this at our next meeting.
The remainder of the meeting was devoted to looking at members’ work. This is likely to prove our core activity and anybody who is seeking advice or an opinion on work in progress is urged to bring it along. Discussion of images is usually as instructive as looking at them, if not more so, so viewers of work benefit as much as the photographer.
Our next meeting will be on Monday 17 May 2010, at Days Inn, Charnock Richard Services, as previously. We have decided to mount an exhibition of C-NW work at the Martin Parr – John Darwell speaking event in Lancaster in October. The theme of the exhibition is to be simply, and broadly, ‘The North West’, and most of us will probably already have work that will be suitable. But we need to plan this carefully in advance, and we should start now, because there are only three more meetings (May, July and September) before the event. So could all of us who would like to exhibit please bring some images to the next meeting for viewing and discussion.
IHM
Contemporary-NorthWest
The first meeting was held on the 18th January and subsequent meetings will be held at two monthly intervals. Further details from Ian Maxwell mail@imaxwell.com 01524 770278
Message from Bill Jackson as follows.
I got an email tonight saying that some of the work from the Night Of The Hunter (12 to be exact) have been chosen by Rixon Reed, founder of Photo-eye in conjunction with the Center For Fine Art
Photography in Fort Collins museum of contemporary arts new book on international photography, see link
http://www.c4fap.org/exhibitors/2009Portfolio2/exhibitorsannounce.asp
Sudo Hidesawa has forwarded these .pdf files of the RPS Victoria Chapter newsletter (April and May) plus Exhibition entry details Here, Here and Here.
 image © Bill Jackson |
Bill Jackson has won the 'best of show' award at The Centre For Fine Art Photography, Museum of Contemporary Arts in Fort Collins Colrado in their international exhibition 'Trains, Planes and Automobiles'.
